DONETSK, November 4 (RIA Novosti) — A team of Dutch experts has arrived in Donetsk, eastern Ukraine, to conduct preparations for removing the wreckage of the Malaysian Boeing flight MH17 which has crashed on July 17, Donetsk Deputy Prime Minister told RIA Novosti Tuesday.
"Three Dutch experts have arrived to remove the wreckage of Boeing which still remains near the town of Torez. The first consultation with the representatives of our Emergencies Ministry, Ministry of Transport and police was held today. The experts also visited the crash site," Andrei Purgin, who also takes part in the talks, said, adding that the reasons of the crash are not being discussed.
Purgin added that currently the experts are inventorying and measuring the wreckage to find out what kind of transport is needed to take them away from the crash site. They will also determine the route. "Likely [they will take the wreckage] to Netherlands via Kharkov," Purgin said.
According to Purgin, Malaysia passed on the right to conduct operations with the plane's fragments to the Dutch side even though the aircraft belonged to Malaysia. "They got offended at Kiev, because Ukraine kept the Malaysian experts in a hotel for three weeks telling them how dangerous it is to come here," suggested Purgin. He estimates that the MH17 wreckage will be removed from the crash site "in two or three weeks."
On July 17, a Malaysia Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur crashed in Ukraine's eastern region of Donetsk, killing all 298 people on board.
Kiev accused independence supporters of eastern Ukraine of shooting the plane down, but has not provided any evidence for this assertion. The local militia leaders have said that they do not have weapons capable of shooting down a plane flying at 32,000 feet.
On September 9, the Dutch Safety Board issued a preliminary report on the MH17 crash, saying that the Malaysia Airlines flight broke up in the air probably as the result of structural damage caused by a large number of high-energy objects that penetrated the aircraft from the outside.
